


Morosexual Cubed

by A_Tomb_With_A_View



Series: Poly relationships, but you're dead [1]
Category: Julie and The Phantoms (TV)
Genre: Alex has anxiety, Angst with a Happy Ending, Asexual Bobby Wilson, Bobby has cluster migraines, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/F, It’s Basically, Multi, Promise, Reggie has fibromyalgia, Tw: discussion of addiction, asexual Alex mercer, asexual Reggie Peters, because my dumbass got myself invested yesterday, but! Then it gets happy, luke too but it’s not mentioned, meets ghost Bobby, meets ot4, okay so, they’re all ace okay, this is kinda angsty for a while, tw: discussion of childhood emotional abuse, tw: discussion of opioid abuse, tw: mention of alcohol abuse, what I planned for and here you are living
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-07
Updated: 2021-01-07
Packaged: 2021-03-18 14:35:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,798
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28619670
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/A_Tomb_With_A_View/pseuds/A_Tomb_With_A_View
Summary: The first time Reggie hid from his parents while they were fighting he was six, and although he knew rationally that neither of them would ever hurt him, last week he’d tried to ask them to please, stop yelling and just talk it out, like you always tell me to, and his dad had glared at him so viciously that there wasn’t a single night since that Reggie hadn’t dreamed of being chased by some six armed monster wearing his dad’s face, so he’d decided the best place to be was as far away from them as possible.
Relationships: Alex Mercer & Willie (Julie and The Phantoms), Bobby | Trevor Wilson & Alex Mercer & Julie Molina & Luke Patterson & Reggie Peters, Bobby | Trevor Wilson & Flynn & Alex Mercer & Julie Molina & Luke Patterson & Reggie Peters & Willie, Bobby | Trevor Wilson/Alex Mercer/Luke Patterson/Reggie Peters, Bobby | Trevor Wilson/Reggie Peters
Series: Poly relationships, but you're dead [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2099874
Comments: 40
Kudos: 141





	Morosexual Cubed

**Author's Note:**

> Hi kids!  
> So. This is an interesting little thing in that I had no plan on writing it. I woke up two weeks ago with the intense need to attempt to write out what I’d planned to do with and here you are living, but then I wanted Bobby, and I whacked out 4K in one sitting and abandoned it, and then yesterday I wrote some ot4 and got my own dumbass invested, so I decided to finish this tonight, so here we are.
> 
> As always, everything relating to the emotional abuse, fibromyalgia, brush with opioid addiction etc is rooted in my own personal experience, and I’m perfectly comfortable answering questions you may have, but please keep in mind that I’m not an expert or an authority, and this is entirely based on my own experience, not any professional research or knowledge. 
> 
> With that in mind: enjoy!

The first time Reggie hid from his parents while they were fighting he was six, and although he knew rationally that neither of them would ever hurt him, last week he’d tried to ask them to  _ please, stop yelling and just talk it out, like you always tell me to,  _ and his dad had glared at him so viciously that there wasn’t a single night since that Reggie hadn’t dreamed of being chased by some six armed monster wearing his dad’s face, so he’d decided the best place to be was as far away from them as possible. 

There wasn’t much space for him in the attic his parents had converted into a bedroom - under the bed was taken by random things that had probably been claimed by the spiders his big brother always said lived under there, and the room was made smaller by the cupboards lining each side of the room, and hiding in the bed would be too obvious - but he managed to squeeze himself behind the wardrobe at the other end of the room, and he sat there listening to the steady thud of his heart until the screaming stopped and he heard the back door shut heavily, signalling that his mom had probably gone out with her friends. 

The crawl space behind the wardrobe quickly became a safe spot for him, for a couple of reasons, but mainly because it was just big enough for his brother and sister to join him if they kept their limbs tucked in, but his mom and dad would never think to look there, and the wardrobe was too heavy to move to get them out anyway. Sure, he could still hear the arguing even from there, but by the time they had risen two floors, their voices had lost their power, at least a little, and Reggie could pretend for an hour that they were just really good at playing sardines.

——

The first time Reggie understood for a millisecond the all-consuming, burning rage that he thought his parents felt he was ten-and-a-half, and wondering how in god’s name his neighbours could smile and wave every morning as he walked to school, and provide him easily with a bag of sugar when his mom asked him to fetch it, and not say something about the constant fucking screaming. 

He knew his parents would never lay a hand on him. 

He knew his neighbours didn’t know them well enough to make that call. 

He knew that if he and his siblings could hear their voices two floors up, then Mr and Mrs Knight could hear them through the ridiculously thin wall between their houses. 

He knew that Ms Green at school said that adults were good, responsible people and that if adults thought you might be in danger that they’d do something, and he knew that the lady in the weird flowery skirts who came in every three months said that constant, unceasing yelling was a form of domestic violence, and that people who knew that kind of thing was happening and just observed it and allowed it to continue when they had the power to stop it - like by calling the number she made them memorise in case they ever saw something like that - weren’t all together much better than the people doing it. 

He sometimes wondered if that made  _ him _ not-much-worse than his parents, because he’d had that number memorised since he was eight and he’d never used it, even when his mom had slammed the kitchen door so loud that she’d woken little Sarah up, even when his dad had twisted his ear because he’d asked if they could  _ please just don’t yell for one day, it’s my birthday.  _

The next time Mrs Knight handed him a bag of sugar he dug his nails into his palm so hard he was sure they would come away bloody.

——

The first best day of Reggie’s life happened when he was ten-and-three-quarters, and a blond boy that he’d never spoken to, but had heard his teacher call Mr Mercer, crashed - literally - into his life. 

The boy tripped over a chair leg, or a table leg, or possibly Tyler B’s foot, and toppled instantly, barely avoiding braining himself on the corner of Reggie’s table by a fraction of an inch. 

Reggie was pretty sure that if he ever did something like that, and in front of the whole class, nonetheless, he would’ve run out, probably crying. 

Mr Mercer just breathed in shakily and got to his feet, taking the seat next to Reggie. His cheeks had gone bright red, and honestly his eyes looked a little glassy, but other than that he looked fine. 

“Hi,” Reggie whispered. “My name’s Reggie. Are you okay?” 

The boy turned him a little bit. “Alex,” he said, voice breathy, like he was trying not to cry. “Nice to meet you. I’m okay, thanks.” 

“Do you like dinosaurs?” He asked Alex, tentatively, because dinosaurs was kind of a make-or-break subject, and if he had a new friend, maybe he could finally spend a couple hours not at home once every few days, like when Sarah had tea parties, or Danny went to play video games at Mike’s place. 

Alex smiled a little. “Yeah, my favourite is probably the dreadnought. Or ichthyosaurs, they’re pretty cool, too.” 

Reggie beamed at him. “My favourite is the car-charo-donto-saurus,” he said slowly, doing his best not to trip up over the long name. “Did you know some people call it the great white shark dinosaur?” 

“I’ve never heard of that one,” Alex admitted. “But my mom got me a dinosaur encyclopaedia for Christmas. If you want, you could maybe come over and we could look at it?” 

Ah.

  
Reggie shrugged, the bubble excitement that had started to rise in his chest bursting. “I can’t. It’s just. Um. Reading? All the letters get all jumbled, I won’t be much fun.” 

“That’s fine, I can read it out loud? Mom and dad want me to start doing readings at the church, so I could do with the practice,” Alex offered. “I keep stuttering over things when people watch me read because I get all nervous and shaky. And there’s pictures.” 

Reggie grinned at him. “I’d love to.”

——

Reggie’s friendship with Alex quickly evolved into a friendship with Luke Patterson from home room and Bobby Wilson from chemistry, and from there evolved Sunset Curve, the best thing that ever happened to Reggie. 

The next four years were filled with high school maths classes and special Ed English classes and learning bass from the weird music teacher who didn’t care when his fingers bled, and going half-ers on a thick shake with Bobby because they needed every last cent to go towards getting their own instruments, because Alex had customised his drum kit to say Sunset Curve, and Luke had doodled their first logo design onto his guitar with one of those shitty metallic pens, and Reggie just wanted something of his own. That, and noticing how his bandmates were quickly becoming the prettiest guys in the world. 

The next four years were also filled with yelling that never seemed to get better, and his mom telling him way too much about the finances and the stress of living that close to the sea and how his dad was a miserable good-for-nothing, and his dad telling him too much about how his mom was probably having an affair and about how he just wanted to be able to do his own thing for a day instead of being called selfish or awful. 

——

When Reggie was fifteen and three days, his mom slammed a pepper grinder onto the kitchen table so hard a glass fell off and broke.

Reggie felt like he’d been kicked in the chest. 

He ignored it. 

——

As the best thing that ever happened to him grew from jamming out in the back of Mrs Patterson’s car into Reggie buying his first bass guitar from four years of Christmas and Birthday money he’d not spent, into pillow fights in Alex’s huge bedroom, into playing their first original song during the prime gig spot at Tuesday Night Cafe, the worst thing that ever happened to him grew from a slight twinge in his ribs when he got a curt text from his dad, into pills that the doctor called NSAIDS that were so big they made Reggie throw up, into a box of tiny little pills that said  **Warning: May Cause Addiction** on the label that Dr Mawd said he had to take four times a day, into staring at a clock and wondering where the past four hours had gone. 

It turned out it was pretty hard to be in a band when staring at sheet music too long made the notes dance and the staves blur, and when he got so caught up in watching the carpet ripple out of the corner of his eye that he missed three songs, and Bobby quietly asking if he was okay, and when he needed to sleep fourteen hours a day, even when he went to school, which he wasn’t doing often. 

Sometimes, Reggie was pretty sure that the only reason he didn’t wind up slipping from codeine to morphine to heroin like his mom had been sure he would was because his dad had shattered a glass practically in Reggie’s face when the hospital Bill had come through, and he’d flinched and caught his ribs on the doorframe so hard that the pain cut through the fog for long enough for him to call Alex, who guided him through asking for a new doctor, who was much more interested in actually figuring out what was wrong with Reggie, instead of just numbing the pain. 

The new doctor suggested Lupus, first, which his mom threw a fit about, because Lupus was  _ long term,  _ and that meant expenses, and  _ Jesus fuck, how am I supposed to divorce that son of a bitch if all our fucking money is going towards this, now, huh?  _

The information Alex relayed to him about Lupus as he carded his fingers through Reggie’s hair was… bleak. Kidney failure didn’t sound great, and neither did being in pain for the rest of his life. Luke kept reminding him that he didn’t have most of the symptoms on the list, which was helpful but also kind of not, even if the way he looked at Reggie with earnest eyes and a promise in the set of his jaw made Reggie’s heart flutter, but Bobby was realistic, and Bobby had started having cluster migraines three years ago, so he got it, a little, and he held his hand while he stared at the night sky and wondered if he was ever going to be able to do anything that he dreamed of if he was always going to be held back by joint pain and “flares” and crushing waves of fatigue. 

——

The physiotherapist and the rheumatologist both agreed that he didn’t have Lupus, and instead told him he had something called fibromyalgia. They said it wasn’t like Lupus, it wasn’t an autoimmune disease, it wouldn’t make his kidneys fail or give him a rash, but they didn’t really know any more than that. They said it would explain why he’d not suffered much withdrawal from the narcotics: they’d not done enough for the pain to result in more than a very mild addiction because it was some weird kind of psychosomatic thing, that was very real to his nerves, but not to anything else, like a drug. 

His dad told him to work it off in the gym and hope it would go away soon, like the physiotherapist said it might, and his mom said he needed to reevaluate his goals and plans to make sure he could actually live them because clearly he was gonna be in pain forever, like the rheumatologist said was probable.

The new drug they gave him was blue, which was cool, even though red would’ve been cooler, and they told him to take one a night for the first month, then two the next, then three, all the way up to five, which sounded way better than just being thrown straight into four a day. 

They weren’t too bad, not like the codeine had been, and the cocodamol Dr Harl suggested he take with them to help out a little bit didn’t make him feel completely out of it the way the strong stuff had. It just made him sleepy, and then he would wake up at a normal time, having slept normal hours, and sure, the first week of each month Luke would tease him about his huge pupils, and his dad would make some concerned comment about how the lady at the pharmacy had given him the evils over buying yet another box of cocodamol, and his mom would insist they didn’t have the cash to support a lifetime of medication, but he could play the bass, in time, for a whole rehearsal again, and that was all that mattered.

Five was kind of a rush of stumbling around and laughing at everything, the first week, and he was pretty sure he kissed Bobby, but Bobby didn’t mention it, so Reggie pretended it was just a drug-induced dream, and continued pining and hoping none of them would ever notice him. 

——

The yelling didn’t bother him at night, not anymore, not when his sleep was scheduled and controlled by a blister pack on his nightstand, even though Bobby didn’t believe him much and kept offering the sofa-bed in the garage.

He knew it was still happening, because he woke up with Sarah curled into his side, and some morning he knew it must’ve been real bad because Danny brought them chocolate chip pancakes in bed, which meant his dad had left as early as possible, or it meant that his mom had slept in there, again. 

Reggie tried not to spend too many nights at Bobby’s at first, since he knew Sarah preferred his room, because Danny’s had a cutout or two that made the shadows weird at night, and he wouldn’t wake up when she climbed in - couldn’t wake up, really - and she could pretend it was her room and it was a totally normal thing to do, but then she got older and started staying the night at friend’s places, and when they all got phones and could actually coordinate that kind of thing, he found himself holed up on Bobby’s sofa with Alex, who’d moved in there after coming out to his parents after Johnny, a senior on the football team, kissed him at Lizzy M’s homecoming party, more nights than not.

Two weeks before Reggie’s seventeenth birthday his mom walked out for the first time during an argument, and Sarah’s best friend said her parents said it was okay for Sarah to stay there for a couple of months. Danny had just moved out to go to college, and Reggie had enough money for three months of his prescription, even though it wasn’t nearly as effective as it used to be. 

Packing his bags and settling them next to Alex’s didn’t feel anything like the victory he’d thought it would. His chest hurt so bad he couldn’t use his guitar strap for a week, and nights were spent with his head in Alex’s lap, wishing desperately for the medicine to work as Alex read out loud to him. Mornings were spent with Luke, bouncing ideas back and forth between them so quickly they stopped using any words that weren’t necessary. Evenings were spent slumped against Bobby’s side, relishing the way Bobby pulled him close and letting him try to put to words how much the idea of sex made his skin crawl. 

——

The first time Reggie got drunk, the dizzy, spacey feeling reminded him so violently of the codeine that he threw up and vowed to himself he’d never drink again. 

The second time he got drunk, it was three in the morning and he’d been staring at the ceiling for hours just begging and pleading with himself, god,  _ anyone  _ for sleep when he remembered the bottle of vodka Bobby had gotten that first time that they’d never moved on to drinking. 

There was no third time, because the next morning he woke up and remembered how fucking awful his first day without codeine had been, remembered hearing his mom bitch about finances as his dad carried in another crate of beer, remembered how Alex had read studies to him about transferral of addiction from substance to substance when he’d fallen into some mad research rabbit hole, and made the boys promise to never let him near any. 

——

“Don’t you boys have street dogs to be getting, or something?” Bobby asked the three of them two hours before they performed at the Orpheum, glancing back at Rose to wink at her. 

Reggie knew it was selfish, but last week they’d played some stupid truth or dare thing and Alex hadn’t even properly been dared to kiss him but he  _ had _ , and Luke and Bobby had looked as interested as Reggie imagined he would if they’d been the ones kissing, and if everything went well tonight they were gonna be  _ legends,  _ so he had plans for after the show, that involved confessions and making out and band cuddles, so instead of letting Luke lead him away, he grabbed Bobby’s wrist, and smiled apologetically at Rose. “C’mon, man. You’re not skipping out on the last supper.” 

Bobby’s gaze darted down to where Reggie had grabbed him, up to his lips, then finally back to his eyes. “Oh. Um. Sure, yeah, you’re right. Sorry, Rose, maybe we’ll catch you tonight?” 

Rose laughed and nodded. “I’ll be here.” 

Reggie scribbled his number down on a folded piece of paper in his pocket. “Give us a call, we’ll get you backstage?” 

“I’d like that, thank you, Reggie.” Rose smiled knowingly at him, and Reggie did his best to Will away the blood rising to his cheeks. 

Bobby knocked their shoulders together as they jogged to catch up with Alex and Luke. “Hey, um. If there’s a particular reason - outside of us being best friends and this being the biggest night of our life - that you didn’t want me to stay with Rose… it’s. Just know it’s reciprocated.” 

“Yeah? And what about those two fools?” Reggie let go of Bobby’s wrist and let his fingers brush against Bobby’s. 

Bobby caught his hand and laced their fingers together. “It’s always been the four of us, Reg.”

“You guys done, yet?” Luke called from where he and Alex had stopped to wait for them. 

Alex grinned and shot Reggie a thumbs up, even if his smile wasn’t quite as bright as it usually was. “Oh, fuck off, Luke, let them be all shy and weird.” 

“Yeah, yeah, we’re here,” Bobby said, rolling his eyes. “And we need a word with you fools, after the show.” 

“Ooh, sounds ominous. Are you leaving the band to be a romantic duo and produce gay love songs?” Alex teased, leading them to the street dogs place, wrinkling his nose as always when he got pickle juice somewhere it probably wasn’t supposed to be. “Man, I can’t wait until we can eat somewhere where the condiments aren’t served out the back of an Oldsmobile.” 

Reggie snorted and started assembling his hot dog. “Maybe if Luke agreed to do a country song I wouldn’t need to tempt Bobinald into it with offers of kisses? Anyway, let’s just bask in the glory of what we’re gonna be doing in two  _ hours _ . And stop being picky, you, I’ve seen you eat cake off the floor.”

When they’d all crowded in on the couch, Bobby sitting cross legged on the arm of it like he always did, Luke cleared his throat.

“This is  _ awesome,  _ you guys,” he started, and three of them immediately stopped chattering to watch him. Reggie didn’t know how Luke did it, but his speeches could probably convince them to move mountains. “We’re playing the Orpheum. I can’t even count how many bands that have played here and ended up being huge. We’re gonna be  _ legends _ .” He held his hot dog in toast. “Eat up boys, cause after tonight, everything changes.” 

Reggie tapped his hot dog against Luke’s at the same time as Bobby and Alex then took a bite, leaning against Bobby lightly. 

Alex pulled a face. “That’s a new flavour.” 

Bobby coughed. “It’s interesting, that’s for sure.” 

“Chill, guys.” Reggie nudged Bobby gently. “Street dogs haven’t killed us yet.” 

——

Dying  _ sucked.  _

Reggie had never been good at sitting and doing nothing, and even for an hour, listening to Alex cry but being unable to move any closer was awful, and he couldn’t reach for Bobby or shuffle towards Luke, he just had to sit there, by himself, thirty centimetres and a million miles from the people he loved most in the world. 

Landing with a zip on his jacket digging into his rib when they got dragged out of it sucked even more than dying, really. 

“Hello?” The girl who’d summoned them called, waving around her crucifix. “Are you still there? Whatever you are? I know I saw something, I’m not crazy.”

“Well, we’re all a little crazy,” Luke said. 

Bobby cuffed him over the head and interjected just as she opened her mouth to scream again. “I’m sorry about him, and for scaring you. I’m Bobby. Please don’t attack us with your cross.” 

The girl held her crucifix out in front of her like some kind of deterrent. “I’m Julie,” she said slowly, eyeing them distrustfully. “What are you doing in my mom’s studio?” 

“ _ Your mom’s  _ studio?” Luke echoed, trying to shove past Bobby. “This is  _ our  _ studio! Look, my couch!” He managed to get past Bobby and dived onto the couch. After a moment he sat up. “But that is definitely not my six string.” 

Bobby cleared his throat. “Okay, he’s not sorry, but we don’t know him.” 

“Robert!” Luke protested, looking up. 

Bobby sighed and raised his gaze heavenward. “My name is still Trevor, Luke.” 

“No, it’s not, that would be stupid.” Luke rolled his eyes. 

Alex nodded. “He’s right, man. We’ve called you Bobby for six years, you can’t just spring Trevor on us.”

“Robert suits you, bro,” Reggie agreed, rubbing the heel of his hand against his sternum gently. “Trevor is weird and old.”

“Wait.” Bobby ignored them and held a hand up, still looking up. “Can we have a minute? Luke, get over here.”

Luke climbed over the coffee table to join them. “How did she get her stuff in here so fast?” He hissed. 

Bobby nodded emphatically. “That’s what I was gonna say. There are chairs on the  _ ceiling.  _ That can’t have been quick.” 

“Maybe she’s a witch,” Reggie suggested.

Alex pulled a face. “Okay, there’s no such thing as witches.”

“You sure?” Reggie asked. “I used to think there was no such thing as ghosts.” 

Alex dipped his head in acknowledgement. “That’s fair.”

Luke nodded. “So we’re going with witch?” 

Bobby rolled his eyes and gently pulled Reggie closer, eyes flicking down to his ribs in a silent  _ are you okay?  _ “No, we’re not going with witch,” he said at the same time as Alex. 

Reggie nodded subtly, nudging Bobby’s shoulder in return. “You sure?” 

“She’s not a witch, she’s just scared, okay? Let someone with a softer touch handle this,” Alex said. 

Reggie and Luke snorted at the same time. “Oh, this should be good.” 

“Why are you in our studio?” Alex asked Julie loudly, gesturing around the room. 

Julie crossed her arms. “This is still my mom’s garage, and I still don’t know who - or what - you are.” 

Alex sighed. “Clearly you’re not understanding - clearly she’s not getting it. Okay, look. We’re ghosts, all right? We’re just four dead dudes, and we’re really happy to be home. So thank you for the flowers, they really brighten up the place.”

Luke waved his arms. “We’re actually in a band, called Sunset Curve.”

“Tell your friends,” Reggie chimed in, as always.

“Last night was supposed to be a  _ really  _ big night for us,” Luke continued. “It was gonna change our lives.”

Alex coughed. “I’m, uh, I’m pretty sure it did.” 

“This is freaking me out,” Julie breathed, pulling a chunk of glowing metal out of her back pocket. 

“What is that? What are you doing?” Luke asked.

“It’s my phone,” she told them, then pulled a face. “Nope, stop talking to them. They aren’t real. There’s no such thing as cute ghosts.” 

Bobby hummed. “Uh, I’m pretty sure we’re real.” 

“Oh, think we’re cute?” Reggie grinned, talking over Bobby. 

Alex leaned forward. “Who you calling?” 

Julie glared at him. “I’m googling  _ sunset swerve.”  _

“It’s Sunset  _ Curve,”  _ they all protested at the same time, Reggie moving his hand in a rainbow motion for emphasis. 

Julie eyed them weirdly for a minute then looked back to her phone. “Woah. There  _ is  _ a Sunset Curve. You did die. But not last night.” She shook her head. “Twenty - five years ago?” 

“What?” Reggie grabbed Bobby’s hands and squeezed his fingers gently. “No, no, no. That’s - that’s impossible. After we floated out of the ambulance all we did was go to that weird dark room where Alex cried and I couldn’t reach Bobby.”

Alex recoiled a little. “Well…I don’t think... I think we were  _ all  _ pretty upset. Okay?” 

“But that was just, for like, an hour,” Luke pushed on, ignoring Alex. “We just got here.” 

“Wait, wait,” Bobby held his hand up, letting go of Reggie’s hand to wrap his arm around him, slinging his other arm around Luke’s shoulders. “What year is it?” 

“Twenty twenty,” Julie told him. “You guys died in-”

“Nineteen ninety-five,” the four of them whispered, and Reggie felt Alex move to his other side and grab his free hand. “We died in nineteen ninety-five.”

——

Julie had the voice of a fucking angel, and performing on stage with her - they could be  _ seen _ and  _ heard _ even though they were dead - was exhilerating in a way Reggie didn’t know how to describe, in a way that was so all consuming that it pressed up against his collarbone in the same way that exhaustion did, like his body was so unused to processing unadulterated happiness that it compared the intensity to things he’d felt before to figure out how to respond and found only one match.

Luke looked at her like she’d painted every shade of the universe just for him, and for the first time since Alex tripped over next to him when he was ten, Reggie was scared of losing something he didn’t even have, not really. 

In 1995, when Bobby had suggested they talk to Alex and Luke about the weird tension that had been building between the four of them, Reggie hadn’t been scared at all. He wasn’t always the most observant, but he also wasn’t dumb, and he knew each of his boys better than he knew the pattern of the grain on the back of his parent’s wardrobe, and he knew that they loved each other - they loved  _ him _ \- just as fiercely as they loved him.

When Julie guided Luke back, him singing into her mic, and when Alex returned from his panic walk on Sunset Boulevard with stars in his eyes, Reggie was reminded that in all the time he’d never doubted that they were his every inch he was theirs, they’d kind of been each others’ only options. Inter-band dating would’ve been weird and unbalanced if it were just two pairs, because they’d been a unit of four from the second Bobby had thrown his messenger bag at their lunch table and declared that he thought they seemed cool, and now every time he and Bobby got a moment alone they spent their time curled up and watching shitty films on what Julie called a “firestick” and convincing themselves that they were happy for their best friends.

“It’s good, right?” Bobby asked him, probably for the millionth time. Everyone else was out - Alex was doing something with Willie, and Luke and Julie were songwriting together at the beach - so they’d decided to watch the sequel to one of the less awful films they’d found. It wasn’t great. “That we’re not. That we never… They got to experience having options before they made a decision.”

Reggie nodded against his chest, a hot water bottle from Julie pressed against his ribs. It was weird, having conversations about feelings without Luke and Alex. Reggie had never kept a secret from either of them before, and neither had Bobby. It felt like lying, to whisper things to each other, disguised by the sobbing girl onscreen, with the intention to never tell them. “It would hurt more if we had them and lost them.”

“You’re enough for me,” Bobby said gently after a moment. “I don’t- I didn’t mean to come across like you’re not.”

“I know, Bobbit, and you me” Reggie reassured him, fisting a hand in his t-shirt so he could tug him down to kiss him. “It’s just weird, being a pair. It’s like. Y’know what people say about being a third wheel? It’s like that, but the other way around. We’ve been a four since fifth grade. We just need time to figure out how to be a bike instead of a car.”

Bobby nodded, pressing a kiss to the corner of Reggie’s mouth. “And it’s not like we’ve lost them. They’re still there. I guess i just never considered that it would be anything but the four of us. Willie and Julie seem good for them, though. I’ve...I guess i’ve never seen Al this happy.”

“I’m happy for them,” Reggie agreed, as someone got yelled at for their shitty decision on screen. “If we can’t make them that happy then it would’ve been selfish to keep them.”

“Yeah.”

“Alex told me that Willie told him there’s a word for people who don’t like sex. It’s been around for a while, but not in the circles we moved in. Asexual,” Reggie said eventually, when the silence starting pressing up against his breastbone. “We’re asexual. There’s a flag and everything.”

Bobby cleared his throat like he always did when he was trying not to cry. “That’s pretty fucking cool, man.”

Reggie nodded. “And when me and Willie hung out last week when Julie and Alex were shopping, they said there’s marches - remember when we found that book about Stonewall? Like that, but they’re these… celebrations, i guess. Of people like us, and them, and Alex and Luke, and Mrs Stevenson from that club we played who told us she wasn’t always Mrs Stevenson. Pride parades, Willie called ‘em. They’re huge, and celebrities play, and they’re safe for the kids, and it’s not - AIDs isn’t, it’s still a  _ thing _ , but it’s not like it was - and it’s legal, now, to… to be what we are.”

“Shit, Reg…” Bobby’s arm tightened around him ever so slightly. “God…”

Reggie inhaled shakily. He was sure with some couples, it was uncommon to say things like what he was about to after so little time, but he’d never doubted how much he loved his boys. He loved Alex and Luke enough to let go, after all. “Baby, if we’d made it to 2020 alive, we could’ve gotten  _ married _ .”

\----

It turned out - kind of unsurprisingly, really - that without digestive systems, they couldn’t take meds, either. Bobby’s head had him out of commission for an entire week, which fortunately coincided with Ray grounding Julie for sneaking out, and every night Reggie stared at the ceiling for hours in the hopes that he could at least fake sleep the way the others could, and without anything at all - no sleep, no comfort food, no tangibility to hold hot water bottles half the time - the flares were worse, and there was a constant dull ache in his sternum that only faded when Julie was singing with them. Sometimes, Reggie wondered if she had some kind of actual magic, and if she really was a witch like he’d first suggested. Sometimes the awful cotton stuffy feeling in his brain left him reaching into an empty space for her name and finding only the warm fond feeling that reminded him he loved her. 

\----

“Willie told me he’s aromantic,” Alex said out of nowhere, three hours before the gig Luke had gotten them in a place near where Willie’s not-dad had some kind of ghost-club that they’d considered going to, but eventually decided against on the grounds that Willie looked kind of terrified every time he mentioned Caleb. “And, I don’t know how to use Julie’s laptop, but i wanna research it properly so i don’t say something dumb, and i know you’ve figured out how to use it.”

“Sure, man,” Reggie agreed, grabbing the laptop from the floor. “A-ro-man-tic, right?”

Alex nodded and plastered himself against Reggie’s side to read over his shoulder. That was one of the things that at least hadn’t changed with everything going on with Julie and Willie - Luke and Alex didn’t pull away from them. “ Aromanticism (or aromanticity) is an orientation in which someone does not experience romantic attraction. Aromanticism is often confused for asexuality, but asexuality is only a lack of sexual attraction. Not all asexuals are aromantic, nor are all aromantics asexual,” Alex read out. 

“Oh, shit, Al…” Reggie pressed his cheek against Alex’s gently. 

“Hmm? Oh, this is interesting. I guess it’s kind of like us, right? But for romance, not sex,” Alex scrolled down through the website, and Reggie stopped trying to parse out the text.

“Aren’t you and Willie dating?” He asked after a minute of trying to hold it in. “You kind of look like you’re in love with him when you talk about him, and i know you never  _ said _ you were dating, but…”

Alex raised both eyebrows. “Uh, no? I mean, don’t get me wrong, I experienced a very strong - um, shit, what’s that thing Flynn always says when Julie goes pink when we watch that film?”

“Gay panic?”

“Yeah, right. I gay panicked very hard, and sometimes he wears a crop top, and i die a little bit inside, but they’re kind of… Remember Sarah and her best friend… um, Jake were super close? And it was kinda siblingly, but also kind of like they were a little bit in love with each other but it wasn’t not romantic? It’s like that.”

“Oh,” Reggie said, mind racing and ribs twinging. “That’s. Um. So who  _ have _ you been writing love song lines about? Because I saw some in Luke’s notebook when i was putting my latest country song in there, and i didn’t know you’d met anyone else.”

Alex looked up at him, eyes wide and cheeks red. “Oh, um. No-one? They’re just random things I thought of, y’know?” He laughed awkwardly, the way he always did when he lied. “Off the top of my head.”

Reggie nodded slowly. “Um. Yeah. Will you tell Willie that he’s overdue on a hangout session with me? He gives better hugs than all of you, and I miss him. And. Uh, i have. A date? With Bobby, now. So… i have to go.”

Alex blinked, visibly confused, and moved to let Reggie stand up. “Okay, sure, man. I’ll pass on the message.”

“Thanks, bro.” Reggie kissed Alex’s cheek lightly, insisting to himself it meant the same as every other time he’d done it since Luke had decided they weren’t going to be afraid of affection like other boys in seventh grade, and ignoring the sharp pulse in his sternum that insisted he was a fucking liar. “See you in a bit.”

He poofed into the kitchen to find Bobby staring at the sink, looking shell shocked.

“Bobby, sugarplum, we need to talk, right the fuck now,” he declared, reaching for Bobby’s hand automatically. 

Bobby nodded absently, watching as a single drop of water fell from the tap into the basin. “Luke and Julie aren’t dating, Luke has been playing fairy godmother so that Julie will tell Flynn how she feels.”

“What,” Reggie said flatly, then shook his head. “Alex and Willie aren’t dating either. Alex had a big crush on him for a bit, but Willie is aromantic - he doesn’t like people like that.”

“So…” Bobby mused, turning to lean back against the counter and pulling Reggie into his arms. “When they didn’t tell us that they’re dating people, it’s… genuinely because they’re not dating people? And we got so insecure about watching them make friends outside of us for, like, the first time that we forgot to actually have a conversation with the two people we know best in the world?”

Reggie laughed wetly and nodded, leaning forward to rest his forehead on Bobby’s shoulder briefly before looking back up. “Yeah, pretty much. Julie’s definitely gonna yell at us about this when she finds out.”

Bobby paused. “Do… Do we tell ‘em?”

“We can’t not, can we?” Reggie asked, shrugging helplessly. “I hate keeping a secret and i feel like i’m lying  _ all _ the time. I’d rather just know if it’s not like that, than do this again. Besides, we’re  _ dead, _ baby. If it goes really badly we just agree not to talk to them for twenty years so we can get over them and meet up here, when Julie is like…  _ old _ , and we go from there.”

“Okay,” Bobby agreed after a moment. “After the performance, tonight?”

Reggie punched Bobby’s shoulder gently. “You just wanna see Al post-show with his stage-hair and shit one more time before we exile ourselves for a couple decades,” he teased.

Bobby rolled his eyes but pulled him closer to kiss him. “Yeah, and? Don’t tell me you don’t wanna sing three inches from Luke’s face one last time?”

“Touche,” Reggie admitted. “Touche.”

\----

The show was awesome, and now that Mr Molina actually knew about the band and Julie wasn’t sneaking out to join them at gigs, the conversations with managers were actually happening - with Ray’s careful supervision - and honestly Reggie was gonna be pretty fucking crushed if he and Bobby did have to exile themselves for a decade or two, because things were getting so  _ good _ , and his body was finally learning to process pure joy in a way that didn’t make his ribs ache and his lungs constrict. 

When Julie got caught up talking animatedly to a manager with Flynn and Ray flanking her, Reggie made eye contact with Bobby to signal this was probably the best chance they were gonna get. 

Reggie had to admit there was nothing quite like his boys after a show. 

Bobby in his stupid fucking suspenders and his shirt with Reggie’s leather jacket over the top with the sleeves rolled up, and the easy grin that Reggie would probably burn cities down for. Alex with his shucked jacket slung over one shoulder and his arms - for once - free and on display, and his hair wild and shoved out of his face, an electric fire in his eyes that always felt far too dangerous to look into and survive. And Luke, god, Luke, loose with exhaustion and exhilaration in a way that nothing else ever made him, buzzing with pride and love, and before Reggie could remind himself that it was a stupid idea and that it was a lack of communication that got him into this mess, he was stepping forward to kiss him, one arm going to curl around his wait, the other rising so he could cradle Luke’s jaw. 

“Is this okay?” He asked, lips centimetres from Luke’s. “It’s okay if it’s not.”

Luke melted into him, eyes flicking down to his mouth and back up. “Yeah, it’s okay.”

Kissing Bobby had always felt like sin in some way - the best way - and whether that was a remnant of the homophobia of their youth, or the fact that Alex and Luke weren’t there, or if it was because Bobby burned with the fires of hell when someone crossed one of the rest of them and Reggie could simply taste the remnant on his lips, he didn’t know, but kissing Luke felt like absolution, like a summer storm washing away his past or a tidal wave crashing over him in an endless rush of adoration and affection and relief. 

A light year away, or possibly impossibly close, he heard Alex speak, voice broken. “ _ Sweetheart.” _

He pulled away from Luke just in time to see Alex cup Bobby’s face in both hands, gentle, like Bobby was something valuable, which he was. “I fucking love you, all three of you, okay?” He said, almost demanding their understanding. “So can we just, i don’t know, forget all the insecurities that come with romance and just remember that we’re  _ Sunset fucking Curve _ . Even if we do let ourselves get bossed around by a tiny scary girl and her crucifixes, we have been best friends for seven years, and I, for one, have been in love with all of you for just as long, so please, Bobby, sweetheart, stop apologising, and kiss me.”

“Where did confident Lexi come from?” Reggie asked Luke, unable to look away as Bobby to the invitation and leaned up to kiss Alex. “I have never seen this boy in my life.”

Luke knocked his shoulder. “We’ve been sitting around watching you dumbasses getting sad and weird ever since we died. We thought you were gonna… well, do this, after the Orpheum, and then we got here and… you never did. He’s been waiting for an invitation to tell you that since the first time you told him to have a good date with Willie, who assumed we were his boyfriends from the get-go. Poor guy’s probably had to deal with more rants than me, but he calms Alex down better than any of us.”

Bobby blinked dazedly when Alex let him go, and Reggie really couldn’t be blamed for reeling him in and kissing him, even if both Alex and Luke made sounds of protest. 

“Reg, gimme,” Luke complained, still glaring at him when he pulled back. “It’s  _ my  _ turn, you selfish bitch.”

Reggie stuck his tongue out, but went willingly when Alex grabbed his wrist. “Snooze you lose, asshole.”

Alex rolled his eyes and immediately leaned forward to kiss him. It wasn’t like kissing Bobby or Luke, nothing as complicated or overwhelming as sin or absolution, because it was  _ Alex _ , and Alex had been the first true friend Reggie had ever made, and needing him was as daily and vital as breathing. Kissing him was just coming home, 

When Alex pulled back he smile crookedly and brushed his thumb across Reggie’s lip. “The next time you’re gonna be a dumbass, will you warn me in advance so i can invest in some ghost-proof antacids and anxiety medication? Pretty please?”

Julie cleared her throat from behind them. “I don’t think they’ll need to be ghost-proof,” she said, pointing a thumb at where Flynn was staring at them, eyes wide as saucers. 

“Is the one who looks like he talks to himself in third-person Luke?” She asked immediately. 

A hand slipped into Reggie’s, and he heard Bobby choke on his tongue. “Point, we don’t know what that means.”

Flynn pointed at Luke, who just sighed with a vaguely wounded expression and looked at Julie. “This one?”

Julie raised both eyebrows. “Says the guy who’s just kissed two guys who thought we were dating for, like, three months.”

“Fair play,” Bobby admitted, then grinned teasingly. “Besides, if everything we’ve heard about you is true, Flynn, you’re probably too good for our Julie-bean.”

Julie smirked faintly. “Unlike you, Bobert, we actually know how to communicate. No insecurity in  _ this _ relationship.” She high fived Flynn without looking, then softened. “We’re gonna head home, if you poof back now, you’ll have fifteen minutes alone.”

Reggie shook his head. “Nah, we’ve gotta go find Willie so they can laugh at us. They deserve the opportunity, after what ‘Lex has probably put them through. Besides, Flynn - and us - need some time to acclimatise to this visible thing.”   
  
Julie rolled her eyes but nodded, and when she offered her hand for a fistbump, Luke’s knuckles bumped against hers instead of going through them. Julie beamed, but wrapped her arm around Flynn and guided her towards Ray,   


Luke sagged into Reggie. “I cannot  _ believe _ she got the guts to tell Flynn before you told us, boys. I lost money on this.”

Bobby pulled a face. “Luke you’re a fucking ghost, you don’t even have money.”

“It was monopoly money, wasn’t it?” Alex asked after a beat. “I’m in love with three morons, Christ help me.”

\-----

Willie gave it a try, they really did, and Reggie truly did have to commend them for the effort they put into not collapsing to the ground in the most adorable giggles Reggie had quite possibly ever seen, asides the time Bobby had had nitrous when he’d had his wisdom tooth removed, because it looked physically painful. 

“I’m sorry, I'm sorry,” Willie gasped after a good five minutes of silently crying into his knees, shoulders heaving with laughs they couldn’t even hear. “ _ Monopoly Money?” _

Alex sighed exasperatedly. “Willie, you told me to go for it, and now i’ve kissed a guy who bets monopoly money.”

Bobby waved a hand in the air, and if possible, Willie looked even closer to actually losing it. “Woah, woah, woah! When the  _ fuck _ did you kiss Luke?”

Luke perked up. “That’s a point, Al. We never kissed.”

Alex rolled his eyes and tugged Luke in to press their lips together firmly, then turned back to Willie with a wild expression, ignoring how Luke blinked rapidly for a moment. “There, now i’ve kissed a guy who bets monopoly money, all because you said i should follow my heart and whatever.”

Willie cackled and hit his fist against the ground. “A-Alex, you cannot… you can _ not _ blame me for you, for you wanting to kiss-kiss… a guy that bets m-monolopy money!” he managed, before dissolving into another fit of laughter. 

“He’s got you there,” Reggie admitted. “You were the one stupid enough to fall for  _ three  _ morons.”

“Morosexual to a whole new level,” Bobby joked, looking way too proud for quoting the meme as if he hadn’t mentioned it every time Reggie did something stupid - like lean against a doorframe as though his shoulderblades weren’t as fucked as his ribs - for the last month.

“Guys!” Willie hiccuped, eyes shiny with residual laughter once they’d managed to get themselves vaguely under control. “You’re all morosexual cubed.”

**Author's Note:**

> Comments and kudos are much appreciated if you enjoyed it!  
> Come find me on [tumblr](https://a-tomb-with-a-view.tumblr.com/) if you want a chat or to request a fic, and my ask box is always open.  
> \- meg


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